Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Final Fantasy/Archive/8

I've been working recently on a couple of the character list articles, particularly the List of Final Fantasy X characters, which I've poked and prodded quite a bit to bring it up to standard. Anyway, it got me thinking again about the standardisation drive and the aim of developing a professional style, so I took a break and began to update the project Style guide relating to article content, focussing on the current consensus on character list and location list articles. I think it'd be nice to be able to cite our style guide when contentious issues arise; the sub-Talk page would also serve as a central area to discuss the guidelines themselves. Take a look sometime and see what you think. >Gamemaker 13:29, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

:Yeah, I was checking out your edits earlier while you were making then and I think they're great. I've been hoping someone would help pad out the style guide for some time - I think it would be great to have uniformity within the Final Fantasy series of articles.. and there certainly needs to be a consensus on what styles each list/article/bio adheres to. Looks good Gamemaker — cuaHL 15:33, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Hi, I'm a member of the Wikipedia:Version_1.0_Editorial_Team, which is looking to identify quality articles in Wikipedia for future publication on CD or paper. We recently began assessing using these criteria, and we are looking for A-class, B-class, and Good articles, with no POV or copyright problems. Can you recommend any suitable articles? Please post your suggestions here. Thanks a lot! Gflores ^Talk 17:40, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Spira for sure. It's better than good!PiccoloNamek 23:16, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

:It's a good one; I just added it to the good articles list. Deckiller 23:17, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

:Final Fantasy VI was almost featured and List of Final Fantasy titles is a featured list. IMO, these are our best two articles. Final Fantasy is also in pretty good shape. --JiFish(^Talk/_Contrib) 23:26, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

::Thanks for the replies. I've added them here... Keep the suggestions coming! :) Gflores ^Talk 23:55, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

:::Does this project not cover lists? --JiFish(^Talk/_Contrib) 12:00, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

::::I had initially thought no, but it turns out, we do cover lists. Feel free to add them or if you're too busy, I'll add them later today. Thanks. Gflores ^Talk 19:27, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey, you might remember that some time back I posted a proposition to change the way we have discussions here at the project, and I hope you don't mind but I'd like to propose it again. Firstly, I love working on the project and still support Seancdaug who set this whole thing up way back in.. August? July? I forget. Except I don't have that much time to help out, and when I do, it's usually in short bursts and I'm not usually logged in.

What I don't mind doing is being the janitor of the project (if I may.. even though that sounds stupid and/or self-appointed). I've got a few proposals.

1. Breaking up the discussion
   If the discussion is broken up into current and community it would help separate it down and help everyone keep on top (without feeling overwhelmed with text to read up on!) To do this I proposed a discussion portal which I've played around with a bit at my sandbox (User:Cuahl/sandbox). Feel free to edit this page anyway you want.

There's also a link for "Project map". That's just something I'm working on which will be an index for the project, so we don't lose track of all these little pages we have at the moment (a style guide, a peer review, multiple subprojects and lists etc) and we can keep them up-to-date.

1. Dating the discussion

My next is adding dates to the titles of each discussion.. basically so it'll look something like:

Jan 10 - Something to talk about

and then we can keep up with when each topic was started.

I'm not saying any of these are good ideas.. they're just ideas. I don't feel like there's much I can add to the articles at the moment (especially seeing as I seem to break the law a lot in the case of image uploading!) so I was going to completely tidy up the project a little. Tell me what you think guys, especially if I should change the talk pages about. — cuaHL 16:20, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

:I do the like the idea of having a Project Portal, I think it could be very helpful. The new design you've put together looks cool and should be more workable than having to update the Portal's boxes with new topics, which was my only reservation with the first layout.

:Regarding the dates, I kinda like the idea of dating the topic headings in some way, but I'd prefer it if the date reflected the most recent comment added to the topic. I've tried it out in this and the preceding topic, using a stardard signature in a level 4 heading, placed at the end of the topic, eg ====~~~~====. People adding to a topic would simply replace the expanded signature heading with ====~~~~==== after adding their own comments (signed in the usual way).>Gamemaker 17:50, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

::Cool, I'll leave it until at least.. 2(?) other people agree on changing the layout of the talk pages before I throw my weight around and change it about. As for your idea on the timestamping.. I see where you're coming from, but that is going to make for a very heavy TOC! I wonder if there's a precedent for this. Maybe another project has tried to arrange some sort of organised discussion before.. — cuaHL 19:13, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

:::I might not have explained myself very well: I meant that we leave only one signature heading in a topic; each editor deletes the existing sig-header (as I've taken the liberty of doing here), writes their comment, signs it, then adds a new sig-header. That way the TOC only shows one date (the most recent) under each topic. It still makes for an ugly TOC, but to be honest the current page is far too big and needs archiving again =) Once that's done it may be workable! >Gamemaker 23:29, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

::::Ah, sorry, I understand now.. would it be too radical to go ahead and change the discussion pages? — cuaHL 16:35, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

:::::Honestly, I sort of worry that this is a little too complex for what is ultimately a simple discussion page, and I think it's only going to lead to problems for infrequent contributors, or newcomers. To be frank, we're relatively quiet, as far as WikiProjects go, and I don't really see the need for change. If the page gets too long, it can be archived. Otherwise, I just don't see much of a problem. – Seancdaug 17:17, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

:::::I think the best thing to do first would be to archive this page again, as we're up to nearly 120k now, and its getting hard to navigate around the latest additions. I guess its true that datestamping the topics isn't really needed when the page itself is a manageable size; I still like the idea of a project portal though =) >Gamemaker 12:39, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

I'm looking at the gaming collaboration of the week. Currently the Square Enix article is up for vote. I believe that falls under our domain considering they made the Final Fantasy games. If anyone is interested in voting for that article, go here. --ZeWrestler ^Talk 18:34, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

Uh hi. Me again. The last missionary, heh. I was wondering on something. The peer review system isn't really used by many members (I don't know whether that's due to lack of advertising it) but maybe we would benefit more from a weekly/fortnightly/monthly collaboration? What do you guys think? I think we'd definately benefit from one or the other. For ease, I'll set up a voting system. Please give me your valued opinions guys and gals(?) — CuaHL 21:18, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

• Collaboration - A fortnightly collaboration would help improve articles better than just giving random advice to other editors and expecting them to sort it out themselves. — CuaHL 21:18, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

A catch-all for topics relating to articles themselves. May benefit from being subdivided further.

While I used to have no problem with every video game character having their own article, my opinion is gradually changing. I was shocked to see that nearly all 45 Chrono Cross characters had their own articles. Sure, I created ones for four of the main characters, but I thought this situation was pretty out of hand. And then I realized how hypocritical I was, having created nearly all of the not-so-notable Final Fantasy IV character articles. So, eventually, I'm hoping to merge them all into List of Final Fantasy IV characters, but wanted to include as much information as possible without being crufty (meaning I didn't want to move the entire article, infobox and all into the list). I ended up with this, and I was wondering if anyone liked/disliked it. I'm not exactly asking about the quality of the prose really, but more of the format. I'm still not sure how I would do this for the NPCs like this, or if I should include Cecil's/Rydia's other portraits. Thanks. — WARPEDmirror 22:52, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

:The only problem I can see is "Class(es)". Since only one character has two classes, would it be better to use "Class". (For Cecil this would be Class: Dark Knight/Paladin.) Other than that minor point, great stuff! --JiFish(^Talk/_Contrib) 14:07, 20 November 2005 (UTC)

::You know, I'm partial to the List of Final Fantasy II characters format myself. Maybe you should consider include the character images like they are in there, with the artwork and both sprites from every version of the game. Even characters like Milon, Dr. Lugaa, and the Magus Sisters have their own Yoshitaka Amano artwork. ~ Hibana 01:39, 3 December 2005 (UTC)

:::Thanks for the input! Maybe I can figure out someway to include the Amano artwork in the template. On a side note, I'm glad you like my format for List of Final Fantasy II characters. I wasn't really sure what images to use for that one and ended with that result. — WARPEDmirror 19:32, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

::Perhaps since the summon creature articles are being merged, a similar format can be made for each of the monsters. ~ Hibana 18:19, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

:I now have included the Amano artwork in the template. It actually looks better than I thought it would, even though Edward, Tellah, and FuSoYa are a lot smaller as they are horizontal images. Any thoughts? warpedmirror (talk) 17:57, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

::Looks good to me. I don't think they are too much a visual problem (Edward, Tellah and FuSoYa).--DarkEvil 18:23, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

::(Speaking of the List of Final Fantasy IV characters article in its entirety) It looks really good. However, might I suggest moving the image cells to the right side of the text? Also, we may want to create a manual TOC, since the template layout means that one isn't generated automatically. Other than that, it's very impressive. – Seancdaug 18:28, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

:::Placing image cells to the right is kind of an habitude here, maybe it would be better, you're right. And creating a manual TOC would be great, I did not think about it, but now that you mention it, this page needs one.--DarkEvil 19:11, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

::Speaking of the List of Final Fantasy IV characters, you will be able to do the same for FFX and FFX2, as I'm loading images for each character mentioned by name (or who talks to Yuna) in the game. I wasn't sure where to add the description of who they are so I ended up putting a short comment in the image itself. Then I just put a small link on the "official" list of FFX and X2 characters Check out Donna on List of Final Fantasy X characters to see what I mean Renmiri 15:45, 3 February 2006 (UTC)Renmiri

I suggest that a consensus be reached upon the famous character articles issue and Seancdaug agreed with this idea. The question may seem simple: Is any character/place worthy of having his own article? If so, which character/location? I earlier talked about it using the page WP:FICT.

It states that characters should be discussed in the main game article. Characters should be talked about in the main game article in a list of. If a character has enough info and takes too much space in the game article, it can then be transfered in a separate article. This is the same for the list if it becomes too big in the game article.

The one rule with more im--DarkEvil 16:06, 18 December 2005 (UTC)portance than the others is this: if a character transcends from the original work, such as appear--DarkEvil 07:01, 18 December 2005 (UTC)ing in a work not directly associated with its original work, or simply making a cameo appearance which would mean the character is kind of renowned, this character seems to automatically deserve his own article.

As the active members should know, character articles are created for no reason, leaving us with the remaining problem of choosing which are to merge. With Wikipedia's policy in mind, we should reach a consensus on what to do with the character articles and exactly knowing what to do with each particular case. Feel free to state your own arguments below, and have in mind that WP:FICT's rules applies also to locations articles, concepts, etc.--DarkEvil 05:56, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

:I just wanted to note that WP:FICT is a guideline which authors have agreed with; not an official policy. With that in mind, there is no reason why we can't have individual articles for each character; the guideline helps decide what you could do with them. If we follow the guideline, separating the list of characters from the main article on all Final Fantasy games would be best since both articles could get long. Having the minor characters in the list of characters seems right.

:Main characters are more difficult. What if a "cameo" character has little information about them? The guidelines are not the supreme law, so I think it would be best to describe the little amount of information about them in each main article, or list of characters they make an appearance in, rather than waste time creating a new article. It seems wrong to have a minor "cameo" character with an article, and a major character without.

:I'm not quite sure if we could ever agree with each other on which major characters deserve an individual article, yet, I'm still thinking of ideas. I could see revert wars happening because of various interpretations of the WP:FICT, but that is why this project is here.

:One idea comes to me; what if we had summaries of the major characters in the list of characters (like we already have), and links to the full article (like some already have). If the article for the major character is not long enough (I propose “less than the height of the full screen view” as an idea), then no other article is necessary (the article could be refitted into the ‘’list of characters’’ article). Its kind of what we have already for a few Final Fantasy articles, except I'd use some kind of rule to decide whether or not an article should exist (like "if it takes up 1x or 2x the 1024x768 resolution height").

:I joined this discussion because I didn’t want to see all of the individual character pages disappear. I hope what I said makes sense _{(it's confusing to me)}, if not, please ask me questions. _{(I have no regret)} --QubitOtaku(talk) 11:23, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

::I understand what you said. I didn't know it was only a guideline (I feel stupid for not reading the obvious notice at the top). I agree with everything you said about character articles being linked from a list, the article gets merged if it has not enough info and if a character expands too much it can become an article. But about judging if it has enough info, that's where I'm not certain. I am at a screen resolution of 1024 X 768, like you suggested for judging the length, but this does not necessarily seem like a good mesuring tool to me, yet I have no other solution. Also, it needs to be good info, not just fancruft because that does not count as enough info to deserve an article. Major characters deserving an article could be, assuming there is enough info about them, the player characters plus the main antagonist (maybe including a major antagonist like Seymour also even if he is not the main in that game).--DarkEvil 16:52, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

::Granted, WP:FICT is not policy. However, I don't think that makes it a good idea to ignore it, or the reasons behind it, when there is no compelling reason to do so. The basic problem here is that we need to justify every article we create as notable outside of their origin work, and very few individual characters qualify. If we have four pages written up on, for instance, Quina Quen, then certainly it's long enough to warrant a seperate entry, if we judge by length alone. But that's misleading, because it's highly unlikely (bordering on the impossible, really) that there are four pages worth of information on Quina that would interest anyone besides hardcore fans. Articles devoted to individual fictional characters are a rarity on Wikipedia, and they're uniformly only devoted to major cultural icons (Dracula, Superman, etc.).

::I certainly don't think we have to forbid individual articles, but I personally would prefer that we start to work at the problem from the other side: rather than creating stubs for every single character first, create character entries as part of a list, and move them into a seperate article if and when the amount of notable information exceeds that which can be contained within the main article and/or a seperate list. From a practical standpoint, it makes sense to consolidate information: there's nothing to be gained from having twelve articles where one will suffice, and it having that many articles makes imposing editorial control, not to mention accessing information from a user perspective, more difficult.

::A word count would be less ambiguous than measuring screen size when it comes to determing length, but I'm not sure such a guideline is going to be practical, really, since its kind of superficial. In the larger sense, I would like to see some sort of standard format for character-related articles/entries, since I think having a sort-of roadmap would aid in decreasing the levels of fancruft that inevitably infest such articles. Start with one introductory paragraph, covering the name of the characters, games in which s/he has appeared, and (if applicable) voice actor. Add a one or two paragraph (max!) section on their backstory, and a one or two paragraph section on their stats/abilities, and maybe a short notes section (where needed). This is the way I went about crafting the current List of Final Fantasy VI characters article, and I think it works well. But the individual character articles seem to suffer from the desire to bulk up their length by adding truly obscure and likely irrelevant information (who really needs to know that Terra's a Libra? Or Cecil's weight? This is the kind of information Wikipedia articles don't give about real people, let alone fictional ones).

::In a broad conception, I still feel that we should be able to demonstrate transcendence before justifying individual articles, and we should be able to point to some sort of source to back up that claim (for instance, a website mentioning the character outside of GameFAQs or other game-exclusive sites). Failing that, we should have a compelling format-based reason for it, such as length. Even then, I would think that splitting the article should only happen as a last resort, after a serious attempt has been made to edit the information down to a more managable size. – Seancdaug 18:21, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

:::I think this is a strong argument, very strong. So, what is suggested, as I understood, is that we should try to merge existing character articles in a list of (most of the existing ones are badly written anyway). If the list becomes too big, after merging, then they can have individual entries, assuming you can validate the notability before picking a particular character. Furthermore, character articles should follow at least what Seancdaug mentioned to stay consistent:

:::*Introduction = covering the character's name, medias in which s/he has appeared, and voice actor (if applicable).

:::*Add a one or two paragraph (max!) section on their backstory

:::*Add a one or two paragraph section on their stats/abilities

:::*Add a short notes section (where needed).

:::*Not add obscure unneeded information such as: weight, astrological sign.

:::The biggest problem, seeing the already existing articles, will be to trim the amount of backstory.

:::Correct me if I'm wrong about the way I understood it, maybe make it more clear if you suggest merging all existing characters.--DarkEvil 19:07, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

::::For the most part, I agree with Seancdaug. Filling the screen is hardly an accurate enough measurement for determining whether to make an article or not. Where I used to have the opinion that each character should have their own article and it shouldn't matter how popular they are or not (If Cloud deserves his own article, so does Josef.) However, I'm beginning to do a 180. Virtually none of the characters have enough noteworthy information to be an encyclopedic article. Only a few characters are exceptions. Cloud is likely one of, if not the most well-known video game character outside of Nintendo's cult-followed group of all-stars found in Super Smash Bros. Melee. He is probably deserving of an article. Sephiroth and Squall Leonhart are also fairly popular. Vivi Ornitier is the most popular character from Final Fantasy IX, but is not a main character and is likely of no significance to the casual gamer. Final Fantasy IVs Edward Chris von Muir is often regarded as one of the worst RPG characters ever. Does this make him deserving of his own article? I think the question Do all these FF characters deserve their own articles? can obviously answered: no. The question at hand is where to draw the line between those who deserve their own and those who belong on a list. warped'mirror (talk) 21:48, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

:::::Yeah that's really the next step. That's why I think it'd be best to create list of characters for all games in the series, merge existing character articles with the list then see if it expands enough to have its own article. The guideline is exactly that it needs to be in a list first, then if it expands too much, it can have an article. So, let's keep it basic and deal with characters in a list first. Are there any who might want to oppose to all character articles merging in a list? I think we're ready for the step where someone could say: "I think this character should not be merged because there's enough info". If not, then they should be merged no matter who they are until/if they expand enough in the list.--DarkEvil 22:20, 17 December 2005 (UTC)

::::::I agree with that, but I am a little concerned. When the Final Fantasy XII characters were merged, information was lost for Ashe, including age and character design. I later added some of these into the list of characters; along with references. Other parts I did not re-add because I didn't have a reference for that information. If we merge all of the character articles together in a list of characters, will we make sure to analyze the article to pick out the the useful and non-speculative information? Its harder to go back to a earlier version of an article that redirects to another. Can we keep the articles for a while longer with a notice (quick example. "this article will be merged into the list of characters") so that people who contributed could help move over the useful information. We can make them cite their sources, and give them rules about what type of information is alowed (ie. name, design, age, non-speculative info, etc). Then the article could be redirected to the list of characters when all of useful information has been moved. Also, it would be easier, so one person does not have to do the work all by themselves.

::::::About the screen height thing I mentioned, it was 4:00 in the morning >.> I don't think its enough to decide the fate of an article, but I havn't heard of much else that addresses this. Word count is roughly proportional to height of the document, so I don't think word count is any better. How long is long enough? I have no idea. --QubitOtaku(talk) 00:12, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

:::::::I think it's not a bad idea, useful information need to get in the list. If everyone agrees now with moving all characters in a list, we should now give a quick guide on what could be moved of the existing articles and then, they will be ready to be tagged with a merge notice or a custom template. About how long is enough, I just think that this would be when all characters are in a list. There is this thing on wikipedia which tells us something like article size is 32kb, you should think about moving info to a separate article or something similar. When the list gets to the point where wikipedia tells it's too big, then we check the characters on the list. Those with the most info (relevant) or proven to have enough notability could then be transfered to a separate entry, leaving a summary on the list and a link to the main article. But which characters deserve a separate entry can only be discussed about if they are put in a list first. So, anyone thinking of the relevant info which should be moved?--DarkEvil 03:14, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

::::::::I thought of: home/birthplace/residence, information about the development of the character (citing interviews with the developers for example), and other specific details that have a valid source: age, race, class, weapon (but not speculation). I only listed a few that I could think of. Thanks for listening to my concers ^-^ --QubitOtaku (talk) 05:51, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

:::::::::It's always good to see discussions about important things evolve to nearly reach an agreement. I personally see no problem with the information you think should be moved, except maybe weapon. Residence as well as age, race, and class are probably part of a character's necessary description (unless unknown). Weapon is not necessarily important to the reader, this seems more important for the gamer. Information about the development of the character seems good enough to me if you can find sources. Anything else to add? If anyone has something to add, you can try your ideas here. At the end, I'll summarize the ideas, we could maybe add that somewhere as a quick guide to moving info from character articles. Also, if anyone still has complaints about moving character articles, they should state their arguments now before we get too far in the process.--DarkEvil 07:01, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

::::::::::Do you really think so? It seems to me that, given that we're talking about video game characters, it would be more important to identify their weapon (or weapon type) of choice than it would be to identify their home, or even age. If nothing else, weapon would very probably be a distinguishing characteristic (think buster sword :-) ). – Seancdaug 07:33, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

:::::::::::Oh right, you know, just saying buster sword is a good argument for me, I nearly forgot that one.--DarkEvil 16:06, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

:::::::A few months ago, when someone mass nominated every Final Fantasy VI character article for AfD, I quickly put together the List of Final Fantasy VI characters article. I see no reason why we can't keep the individual articles at first, until we're all satisfied with a new list article. A sort of transition process, I guess. Assuming that's the consensus, of course. – Seancdaug 07:33, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

::::::::I would like that ^-^ You said it better than I ever could. It would make the process easier in my opinion. --QubitOtaku (talk) 08:58, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

:::::::::Seems good to me, even if I was saying most of the time that we'd need to merge character articles as we go along, it can be a transition process, which could make it easier. I even like that better, by making the list and keeping separate articles, it'll permit us to see a little better which character should be kept. As long as something is done one day. I think I'll start working on the lists if we want that subject to move.--DarkEvil 16:06, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

:I don't have any problem with individual articles for main characters or recurring characters (and big villains). All the other characters can go into Final Fantasy n characters. Dread Lord CyberSkull ✎☠ 10:54, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

:Generally, I think the merge should be based on how much factual information is in the article. I would say the FF9 articles could be merged, but other than that, all the characters in games from 7 and later should have seperate character articles. There's no point merging some characters into lists. Either all characters from any one game should be merged, or they all be kept seprate. --JiFish(^Talk/_Contrib) 15:15, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

::But FF9 characters are from games later than 7. The whole idea of not keeping separate article for all characters except for some exceptions is because that, even if one character in the game has enough info to be an article who may grow further, some other characters from the same game may have just enough information for a paragraph, that doesn't make it a worthy article on wikipedia. But we need a list first to know if we need a separate article for a character or if they all fit in a list (this probably isn't the case for all games in the series).--DarkEvil 16:06, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

:::I did say other than FF9 :P. IMO, the FF9 character articles are small enough to be merged in to a list. This is an exception, FF7, FF8 and FF10 character articles are too large to be merged together. But if we, say, kept Vivi Ornitier but merged the rest, I think that's a bad thing. --JiFish(^Talk/_Contrib) 17:45, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

::::Oops, I did not read carefully! It's not that I am against keeping all character articles, it's more because that, if we keep an article, there has got to be a reason, and while I know that it can be hard to tell, some characters really can't have an article on Wikipedia, even if that means not to have an article for each character in the game.--DarkEvil 19:03, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

::::I see no reason why it has to be all-or-nothing, myself, and I certainly don't think there's much precedent for that, either. Other fictional works aren't treated that way. Look at Dracula: Abraham Van Helsing has his own article, but Quincey Morris does not. And, again, I think we still have the issue of notability: just because character articles from Final Fantasy VIII and Final Fantasy X are longer than articles from Final Fantasy IX doesn't mean that they're neccessarily more notable. Character entries are probably our most significant source of fancruft, and a lot of the length of the existing articles is a result of the accumulation of information that we shouldn't really be presenting to begin with. – Seancdaug 19:03, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

:::::Exactly right, it does not need to be one of the two all or nothing. Some characters simply are notable while some aren't, keeping all articles simply isn't needed when they can fit in a list and it simply makes it harder to manage them as a lot of separate articles.--DarkEvil 19:09, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

::::::I know that an article should be considered on it merits rather than the popularity of the character. But in reality, this is going to be difficult to maintain. Particually with casual editors that may not be part of this project. Why is there an article for X but not Y? will be a common question. Which is why I suggested an all-or-none per game approach. I say keep all VII, VIII and X PC articles and merge the rest. Some kept many have less merit than others, but this way is simple and not techincally incorrect (as they would almost certainly survive a AfD.) However, if the majority is against this and wants to judge each article one-by-one, so be it. --JiFish(^Talk/_Contrib) 21:06, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

:::::::I know what you mean, the problem you mentioned will most certainly appear one day, you're right. But we're here to fix the problems, it'll be easy to answer to a question like this. We should not stop from achieving our needs with the casual editor in mind, after all, the more experienced user is required to correct the errors of the less experienced, and that for all kind of things on wikipedia. Think about the Aerith Gainsborough article, the way the article is named is the right way, they did not think about people who'd name it Aeris, they named it like it should be named and they left a notice about it on the talk page as well as a hidden message when you edit it.--DarkEvil 22:57, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

::::I fall into the camp of judging each character article on its own merits, though a llittle less stringently than Seancdaug =) Basically, if there is enough unique, valid information on the character that including it in a list would make the list unwieldy (and thats going to be anything more than about 2 decently sized paras) then I think it needs to be kept seperate. Having said that, many character articles probably do need some severe editing. JiFish has a valid point, but whatever we do, the problem of spurious character pages being re-created is going to occur. Fancruft happens because people want to display their knowledge, they aren't going to notice/judge/care whether one game has character articles and another doesn't - if something doesn't exist they will create it =) It just needs to be dealt with as it happens. >Gamemaker 12:10, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

:::::Yeah, problems like this are bound to happen, but this should not stop us. As you said, it just needs to be dealt with as it happens. If a character as enough info, yeah it could be that the character appears in the list (summary of the main article) with a link to the main character article. As long as there is enough merit, but to judge that, first, we need to arrange the list. I checked through the games, the only missing list was for FFIX but I created a very basic list for it. Now, all the lists need to be worked on until we're satisfied, then we could start judging the character articles.--DarkEvil 15:16, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

::::::Here's my say in this: Think about what you just said. According to JFish, Kimahri, Red XIII, Barret, Yuffie, Lulu, and Wakka are all deserving of their own articles, while characters like Cecil, Kain, Rydia, Terra, Locke, Edgar, Celes, Zidane, Vivi, and Garnet aren't. (and I'm NOT going into Zell, Selphie, Quistis, and Irvine, all of which have little to no backstory, and are MUCH less deserving of articles than some characters from FFs I-VI and IX) And whoever said "Edward is one of the least popular characters" is right, but as far as I know, Tidus, Selphie, Rikku, Yuna, the list goes on and on, are far more disliked than Edward. Don't think of this as "which game are the characters from?" but rather "How does X character contribute to the story of the game?" The tone of this discussion seems VERY biased toward the Nomura games and anti-Amano. As an Amano fan, I must say I'm a little dissapointed. Anyhow, I just say keep them all. The articles are all fine as they are. In fact I'd personally like to see some popular philosophies about the characters in the articles as well. We can't discriminate by game. I think every PC and villain deserves an article, but minor characters (INCLUDING the likes of Jecht, the entire Shinra team, Gestahl, Leo, Edea and others) need to be in a list. Exceptions include Golbez, Laguna, and Seifer. Crazyswordsman 04:23, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

:::::::It's all about context: put frankly, the Nomura-designed games (that is to say, post-Final Fantasy VII), are far and away more popular than the Amano-designed games, especially to English speaking audiences. Final Fantasy VII, after all, sold over 3 times as many copies as Final Fantasy VI (9.5 million to 3.1 million). Additionally, characters from Final Fantasy VII (and, to a lesser extent, subsequent entries in the series) have shown up in cameos in many other games, and are almost certainly more recognizable (at least, as far as we can measure). We are not crafting a Final Fantasy fansite: we're writing a general interest encyclopedia. "What do these characters contribute to the story of the game" is precisely the wrong question to ask, under these circumstances. We shouldn't be writing indepth critical analysis (or "popular philosophies") about characters, which would almost certainly qualify as original research. We should be careful not to present even the most popular fan theories as anything more than what they are: pet theories held by a small fraction of the total audience of the game (most of whom are casual gamers who don't share our obsessiveness on the subject matter). The only justifiable reason, in the long term, for creating an individual article for a particular character relates to the notability and significance of that character in a broader cultural context. Notability within the context of a particular game is meaningless for Wikipedia, though it's certainly a valid criteria for a more specialized resource, like the Final Fantasy wiki. Please see WP:NOT for more on this. – Seancdaug 04:40, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

:::::::: And we shouldn't be spitting in the face of the pre-Playstation games either. Kefka is the second most notable villain in the series to Sephiroth (I won't argue that Kefka's more notable than Seph, because he isn't. I'm a Kefka fan myself and I WILL say that Sephiroth deserves the spotlight more). But Kuja and Seymour certainly don't. And there have been cameos in other games by Cecil, Terra, Locke, Mog, and Relm. (all in the Mana games), and Setzer will be in KH2. And don't articles about FFVI involve general interest? Many people have played FFVII and beyond, so coming here to learn about what they already know is pointless. These people would probably read the pre-Playstation articles. Crazyswordsman 06:46, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

::::::::: That's exactly the point, though. Wikipedia is a general interest encyclopedia. It is a not a full-length Final Fantasy textbook. We should be writing articles from the perspective of a researcher who may not have played a single Final Fantasy game (or, indeed, a single video game) in his or her life. It's our job to provide a basic summary of the game, in all of its facets, to the uninitiated. Just as an educated physicist would rely on Encyclopedia Britannica as his or her sole reference work, the experienced gamer should not come to Wikipedia expecting the kind of detailed information one would find in a strategy guide, or on GameFAQs. That belongs elsewhere. – Seancdaug 07:44, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

:On a side note, I just created List of Final Fantasy IX characters (needs some tweaking).--DarkEvil 20:40, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

:*About the characters to list of characters thing, I think we should use a template; for the mergable article that little information.

:For example: (Just an example) {{User:QubitOtaku/FinalFantasyCharacterMerge|List of Final Fantasy XII characters}}

:would turn into

{{User:QubitOtaku/FinalFantasyCharacterMerge|List of Final Fantasy XII characters}}

:(This is just an example, do not start using this template. its in my user article T_T)

:I think it would be helpful, and it will inform others why its being merged. Also, it allows others to send the information that can be salvaged from that page before its redirected. Also, if wanted, a list of things to be moved could be added. As always, before I do something on my own, I want to hear opinions, ideas, or changes. --QubitOtaku (talk) 09:30, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

What do we do about this article: Ashe. One side wants it to remain because it has enough information, the other side wants it moved to the list of character because it doesn't have enough information. Its been getting reverted back and forth. I'd rather keep it until every one is happy that all the information that could be moved is moved, or if it ends up being too big in the List of Final Fantasy XII characters, then keep it. WP:FICT is too vague, I think its useless. How big is big enough. Seeing it get reverted and redirected over and over is really annoying me. I'd rather it had not been redirected to begin with... (frustrated) --QubitOtaku (talk) 00:37, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

:For right now, let's keep it in List of Final Fantasy XII characters, where it redirects to. See the discussion on character articles above. ~ Hibana 00:40, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

:I have serious issues with the current (unreverted) state of the Ashe article. The "character design" section is riddled with speculation and original research, which has absolutely no place on Wikipedia. And the article, in its current state, is certainly not too long to be merged. In its entirety, it consists of 425 words. By comparision, the length of the Kefka entry at List of Final Fantasy VI characters is 421 words. And I strongly contest your casual dismissal of Wikipedia guidelines. Yes, it is vague, but, as I've said before, that is not a compelling reason to ignore it. If we're going to contribute to Wikipedia, we need to be willing to play by the rules of the community, and to abide by community consensus. – Seancdaug 00:47, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

::I'd also like to point out that the unreverted Ashe article is still tagged with a stub notice, which further suggests that it lacks the strength to stand on its own at this time. Generally, practice with stubs is to either expand them or merge them, and as has been pointed out previously, there's not much information known about Ashe at this time that would allow us to expand it much beyond its current state (that I'm aware of, at least). – Seancdaug 00:54, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

:::Everything starts off as a stub. It needs work... As for the speculation, how are others to be able to pick out what is and what isn't... You can't just decide that for yourself. I'd rather have everyone work on it. By redirecting it, it makes it harder for people to see what used to be there. They would have to go and look at the history, if they know how to do that. I still rather have it an individual article. Screw the WP:FICT, I wont get banned if I keep the article. By the way, what ever happened to the transition period we discussed. --QubitOtaku (talk) 01:04, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

::::That it is a stub isn't a problem. The problem is that there are no prospects of destubifying it at this time. Again, no one (that I'm aware of) is suggesting that there can never be an Ashe article on Wikipedia. But with the information currently known about the character, there's no immediate prospects of expanding it past stub form. Hence, the merger. And I hardly think I took unilateral action: even you agreed that we should "wait until the game is released" (from Talk:List of Final Fantasy XII characters). And I hardly think it an imposition to expect that anyone so deeply involved in the debate would be unaware of how to access an article's history (or maybe that's just me). And, no, you certainly won't get banned for "keeping the article." But that's a complete straw man: the idea that anyone is being threatened with a ban for anything is laughable and besides the point. It shouldn't be neccessary to threaten anyone into abiding by community consensus. A substantive problem with WP:FICT is one thing, but I still fail to see what is so "vague" about "if the article on the work itself becomes long, then giving major characters an article of their own is good practice." As has already been pointed out, other articles of pretty much identical length have been merged before, so the case that Ashe is somehow different is a little odd. – Seancdaug 01:18, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

:::If the character design section is full of speculation/unverifyable info, remove it. Dread Lord CyberSkull ✎☠ 01:33, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

::::I've just done so. May I now make the request that the article be moved (in its current state) to the list article? As far as content goes, it's still clearly a stub, and its shorter than numerous other individual character articles that have been merged into lists previously. I would also like to apologize for any confusion regarding this: I see User:QubitOtaku has just recanted his previous position at Talk:List of Final Fantasy XII characters, which means that the consensus I had thought we had reached was not so consensual after all. Which goes to show the importance of talking these things through, I suppose. – Seancdaug 01:49, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

As of my most recent edit, I copied the text (minus the "character design" subheading) of the Ashe article to List of Final Fantasy XII characters, to give everyone a better idea of what it would look like if merged. Does anyone have any problems with it? This whole mess notwithstanding, I still feel that there's too little information about Ashe to warrant an individual article, so I would still like to see her article merged into the list, though I will endeavor to make sure we're all on the same page (myself included) before actually merging/redirecting again. – Seancdaug 02:15, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

:I think it should be merged myself. Yes we talked about a transition process for character articles, but this character is from a game not even out yet, it should be difficult to have enough information on it. Other characters from released game do deserve this transition process, but Ashe should not have been created, it's only that we had not reached a decision about character articles when it was created. So, like I said, let's keep that one in a list for now.--DarkEvil 21:54, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

::Did somebody recreate the Kefka Palazzo article? ~ Hibana 16:58, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

It wasn't me!PiccoloNamek 17:23, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

Merry Christmas to all! Well, we sure have filled out this talk page again in a short amount of time. I just wanted to bring up a few new issues for the project. 1.) Throughout the various Final Fantasy pages, the casing of the series mascots, chocobos, moogles, cactuars, and perhaps even tonberrys (tonberries?), is not consistent from article to article. Some instances are capitalized, some are not, especially in their respective main articles. 2.) The article List of Final Fantasy characters may need to be changed as each individual game has it to have its own list of characters and this one encompasses every game. This may be a bit redundant, as the template on the right of each game's character list has this article for the original Final Fantasy. Although there are very few notable characters in the original title, it may deserve an article as well. If the game does get a character list, should it be titled "List of Final Fantasy (video game) characters" or "List of Final Fantasy I characters"? Finally, if the series character list is kept, should it retain its title or be changed to "List of characters in the Final Fantasy series"? ~ Hibana 19:09, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

:Without digging through the archives, I seem to recall that the original idea was to create one character list per game, and that once these lists were all up and running, that the original List of Final Fantasy characters would be dedicated to the first game. I have reservations about calling it Final Fantasy I, because that's not really the title, and I would personally think that the "(video game)" disambiguation would be unnecessary, in light of the template. Plus, we could always add a disambiguation note, similar to what we have at the top of the main Final Fantasy article. But we should probably revisit the issue now and actually make something happen on that front, especially in light of the fact that the LoFFC article is a bit of a mess, at the moment. – Seancdaug 02:59, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

::Well, until we get that straightened out, I'm going to go ahead and correct the mascot casing in all the articles I can find: I recently saw in FFIX that "chocobo" and "moogle" are not capitalized unless their in a name or at the beginning of sentence. ~ Hibana 03:15, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

:I think that Final Fantasy I characters should be created over List of Final Fantasy characters just because this list of characters for the whole series wouldn't be needed after that. We will have separate and more detailed lists for each game with a template which links between them.--DarkEvil 21:57, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

::I just think its a bit redundant to a have a master list of characters when there are lists for each subsequent game. It's not like we would have a master list for the locations (although it may have existed at a primitive point). The series main article even has a link to the first Final Fantasy game's locations; why not have one for the first game's characters? We have an easy-to-see template at the top right of every existing list. I'm even willing to break it and make a sufficient list of FFI characters myself if needed. The Chaos article needs a place to go because it's a bit of an eyesore for how short it is (the guy only appears once in the game). While I'm here, I might as well mention that there's a revert war going on in the Kefka Palazzo article if anyone interested. ~ Hibana 19:42, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

:::Exactly what I meant for List of Final Fantasy characters, you're exactly thinking like me. About the edit war, I knew this would happen one day. I guess it should be discussed on Kefka Palazzo's talk page or something to let them know why it is supposed to be a redirect. Maybe put a notice at the top of each character article for a while explaining that they will be merged into lists one day.--DarkEvil 21:30, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

I talked with ZeWrestler on AIM this afternoon, and filled him in on some of what's been going on with the project in the past couple of months. One of the things we talked about was the image question, and the somewhat sorry state of our templates since we've started to abide by Wikipedia policy about keeping fair use images out of the template namespace. We talked about how best to come up with a legitimately free alternative, and, as we were talking, I cobbled together this. It's not necessarily ideal, but I'd like to think it communicates at least some of the most recognizable elements of the series (it's got a crystal, at least). I've dropped it into the project template for a test drive. My Photoshop skills are... meh... so if anyone wants to try and put together some better, feel free to do so. Any thoughts? – Seancdaug 23:36, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

:I meant to reply to this earlier: I like it a lot! So much, in fact, that I'd happily see it replace the gamepad icon in all our templates. Would anyone disagree? >Gamemaker 13:27, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Not really the most important subject as of right now, but did anyone notice :Image:Chocobo.gif being listed as used on a lot of pages, mainly talk pages. This would be true if it were used in the :Template:FinalFantasyProject as we place it on every FF talk page, but it's been removed from the template a while ago. It's used on the Chocobo article, but I checked on some of the talk pages mentioned in case they were used somewhere in the page, but it's not. I thought this was a funny bug.--DarkEvil 07:42, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

:I noticed something like that some time ago. Some of the pages it links to are now redirects, and I guess when the project's image was that chocobo, the articles were redirected before it was removed from the template. Why it's listing the articles that still exist, I don't know. ~ Hibana 07:48, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

:Its not a bug, its a feature. The server caches things like what is used where. Those pages simply haven't been updated since the template was changed, hence the old references (live references would be too costly to the server). Open one of those pages and save it without editing. You will see the reference disappear. Dread Lord CyberSkull ✎☠ 03:27, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

::Then it explains this bizarre problem. I didn't try saving one of those pages, but anyway, the image is getting deleted (not for this but because no longer really used). What you said makes sense to me, anyway, if this thing repeats for another image, it will go off after a while when pages are edited.--DarkEvil 06:34, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

I was planning on adding some more images to the VII Character List, but I can't really decide if it would be a good idea to include screenshots from Advent Children. Should the list just stick to screenshots from the game itself? Eeno 02:56, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

• I would suggest SS from the game, as they can be rationale'd for fair use for critical assessment of the game etc and while the same can be done for Advent Children, as I understand it, it can be only applied to images on the Advent Children page. Just my 2 cents Chanlord 03:01, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

::AC could always be used for representing them, but fairuse restricts use of these images a lot. Those images can be used anywhere, not necessarily the Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children article, as long as they are used for critical commentary and also, not more than 15 images in all should be used in one page like this, so the most important characters should have their images and not more than 5 images coming from an individual person such as a character artwork which was done only by one person, let's say Tetsuya Nomura. The most important is that we not abuse these types of images, so if an already used image of Cloud somewhere in Wikipedia could do the job for List of Final Fantasy VII characters, there's no reason to push the law and upload one more different image of Cloud. Of course, if no uploaded images is good for what would be needed in a particular article, then you can upload a different image. But I think that for most important characters, one of the images used in their individual articles is certain to be good enough for List of Final Fantasy VII characters.--DarkEvil 06:47, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

I have begun searching the articles for any uses of the word "you" in terms of "the player" and/or "one". Making some progress ^_^ Deckiller 23:22, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

:I've just seen your edits at list of Final Fantasy IX characters, this is great. All instances of 'you' should be replaced by 'the player' in every game related article.--DarkEvil 03:36, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

::Ahh, see now we're having a discussion on that. The general idea is that 'the player' shouldn't be used after all. Please see the project page — cuaHL 22:26, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

:::Really? Where do you mean: I can't seem to find anything like what you're talking about. That'll teach me not to keep abreast of WP:CVG developments.... – Seancdaug 22:47, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

Should a Finest Fantasy for Advance article be created? After all, we have one for Compilation of Final Fantasy VII. Unless there is already an article like that, but I haven't seen one. This is the name Square Enix use for their remakes of Final Fantasy IV through VI on Game Boy Advance.--DarkEvil 06:34, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

:In principle, I see no problem with adding it (haven't heard the term myself, though). I'm a little concerned that there isn't really enough information floating out there yet to produce more than a stub, but I haven't been following things very closely, so what do I know? – Seancdaug 23:30, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

:From the point of view as a Final Fantasy fan who hasn't heard about this yet, I'd probably turn to Wikipedia for information on it. So I think it's a good idea. (omg a post?) — cuaHL 00:19, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

::Hey Cuahl, good to see you sometimes. Seeing the approval from you two should be enough. I'll work on this when I have the time, maybe tonight. I'll be certain to include official references since not a lot of people seem to be aware of this.--DarkEvil 02:33, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

::I just realised that the articles on Final Fantasy IV Advance, V Advance and VI Advance don't exist yet. That makes the creation of this article a little harder. I think I'll wait a little while until all the games are released, we only have enough for FFIV Advance. Out of topic, I'm currently playing french Final Fantasies for the french Wikipedia and I've got to say that the translation in french is awful (but kind of funny), it's good that I understand English.--DarkEvil 07:02, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

:I'm a little hesitant on creating articles for each one of the Advance versions because all the other games with numerous versions (FFI and FFII) have their version differences within the main article. The only situation in which we have seperate articles for new versions are in Final Fantasy Collection, Final Fantasy Origins and Final Fantasy I&II: Dawn of Souls, which were created because they are compilation releases. It's not like we'd have a seperate article for Final Fantasy IV on WonderSwan Color just because it's a little different. And are we even planning on making a seperate article for Final Fantasy III on the DS when it comes out? ~ Hibana 17:03, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

::Yeah, I just played through Final Fantasy IV Advance and it's not a big deal compared to the original. I thought these remakes were supposed to be different enough, but I don't think they'll deserve their own article. Maybe Final Fantasy III DS will deserve an article, although I'm not certain, but they seem to have changed this one a lot. What I really meant after all is that I would like to wait for the release of the games before creating an article like that, or wait for more info, because we nearly know nothing on FFV and FFVI Advance.--DarkEvil 07:27, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

::: I'm not sure where this "Finest Fantasy for Advance" terminology comes from. The games don't seem to mention that anywhere. FF4 is named "Final Fantasy IV Advance", no mention of "Finest" or "for". I also don't think games such as FF4A deserve their own article. The FF4 article already lists the changes between the SNES and GBA versions, and that seems to be enough. Guspaz 20:41, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

::::The name apparently comes from a site (http://www.square-enix.co.jp/ff4a/) that Square Enix launched in October last year. A couple of gaming sites carried the story, but I can't currently connect to the site to confirm. >Gamemaker 13:33, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

I've just tagged both Celes Chère and Sabin René Figaro with {{rename}} notes (to Celes Chere and Sabin Rene Figaro, respectively). My reasoning is that these names are never presented as accented in the game, and both articles are tagged with notes explicitly stating the presence or absence of such accents is pure speculation. Does anyone feel strongly about keeping the current names, or should I go ahead and move 'em (by listing them at Wikipedia:Requested moves, if necessary)? – Seancdaug 04:42, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

:The Wikipedia policy on naming articles states that articles should be named based on what users will most likely search for, not on the "correct" name of the person or topic. Since people would rarely enter accented letters into the search, I think that these renames are appropriate. In fact, I would go as far as to say that the Sabin article should be renamed simply Sabin Figaro since I doubt many people would use the middle name. --Cswrye 18:31, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

::I agree, but I still believe that Sabin's middle name is important since it does display it in the game's ending credits, and never refers to him as simply "Sabin Figaro." I don't even think Edgar is called "Edgar Figaro" in the English version - he's just Edgar, king of Figaro. ~ Hibana 18:26, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

:::Me being a French speaker, I find it does make more sense with the accent, but never has any official material shown it with accent, so this should be renamed like Seancdaug proposed. Meanwhile, I do think that people knowing that he is named Sabin Figaro must have reached the ending credits and therefore know that his name is Sabin Rene Figaro, so it should be his whole name. Also, Edgar's full name is Edgar Roni Figaro in the english version, you can see all character's name in the ending pics at this site [http://www.vgmuseum.com/end/snes/a/ff3.htm http://www.vgmuseum.com/end/snes/a/ff3.htm].--DarkEvil 06:55, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and done the move and caught the obvious double redirect problems. Tomorrow I'll go around and see about correcting the various links, if someone doesn't beat me to it. – Seancdaug 03:53, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

According to [http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-67-49-en-15-chocobo%2Bland-70-1wx.html Play Asia] the title is "チョコボランド A Game of Dice" which translates to "Chocobo Land: A Game of Dice." The page for this game implies that is only the European title.--Dustin Asby 09:29, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Here's some food for thought: we have :Category:Final Fantasy places, but most of the articles in it are titled "Locations in...". It strikes me that :Category:Final Fantasy locations would be a better title. Does anyone have any problems if I just go ahead and put it up for renaming at Wikipedia:Categories for deletion? – Seancdaug 03:28, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

:Sounds good to me -- čĥàñľōŕď 03:32, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

::Agreed. ~ Hibana 03:51, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

:Agreed too, this sounds better too.--DarkEvil 07:39, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

I know we've really been taking things easy around here lately since most of the major issues for the Project were resolved at the end of last year, aside from the character articles which are still under discussion. I'd like to personally thank everyone for all of their hardwork so far. However, there's still plenty of things to do. Some include:

• Deckiller recently pointed out the overuse of second-person pronouns in the articles, which are a no-no according to guidelines. If you see any instances of this, replace them proper wording.
• Major character articles such as Aerith Gainsborough, Cloud Strife, and Sephiroth (Final Fantasy VII) really need to have a close eye kept on them. They're probably edited more than any other articles in the Project and are getting extensively long and sloppy.
• There's an inconsistency of capitalization in the articles for various FF elements including chocobo, moogle, and materia, especially in their main articles. Most of the games keep these lowercase in general, and I believe we should as well.
• Because Kingdom Hearts is part of the Project, it would be really nice if we could decide what to do with the Kingdom Hearts series article that was created late last year. I proposed a major revision on the Talk page, but I'm afraid not many people know about it. If we decide the article should exist at all, I think it should include information that the game articles themselves do not, such as production, music, and graphics, very similar to the main Final Fantasy article. Also, it may need to be renamed Kingdom Hearts with the first game's article renamed as Kingdom Hearts (video game).
• Is anybody willing to format one of our better articles, such as Final Fantasy VI, as a spoken article? I know this is a relatively new feature on Wikipedia, but it's a thought. ~ Hibana 18:51, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

:Yeah, I had problems with Aerith some time ago. For the capitalization, I think I always saw Chocobo, and Moogle capitalized, I'm not certain for materia but I'm supposed to replay Final Fantasy VII so I'll try to check all capitalizations for this game at least. I'd really like to help for the spoken article, but I'll pass my turn as I don't sound as good as a true english speaker. I wasn't certain that Kingdom Hearts was part of the project, thanks for the info.--DarkEvil 05:44, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

::Regarding the creature capitalisation issue, it may help to think of it as just a reference to any other (real-world) species, eg, cats, dogs, which aren't capitalised other than under the normal rules of sentence construction. As for Kingdom Hearts, we may have to fight to claim it as part of WPFF, but apart from that I agree with your suggestions! >Gamemaker 12:41, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

:I would personally suggest that we not go for a spoken article until we get something elevated to featured status, simply because of stability issues: there's no point in going through the process of recording a version of the article if we subsequently go and overhaul it completely in order to get it featured. That being said, it may be worth revisiting Final Fantasy VI and pushing towards getting it featured once more. I'm not sure if it's as stable as it should be, but it's still probably the closest we've got towards being a real contender on that front. – Seancdaug 04:22, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

I merged this article, since it seems awkward to have one item have its own article. If anyone objects, feel free to revert. Deckiller 00:17, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

:Nope, makes sense to me. – Seancdaug 18:43, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

In my opinion, the FFIV story section is very informative, but perhaps too lengthy. I'm thinking we should condense it by about 40-60 percent. Deckiller 16:54, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

• I completely agree. — warpedmirror (talk) 21:58, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

Being a mergist, I was wondering if we could create a list of final fantasy weapons and merge the Buster Sword, Gunblade, Catclaw, and other articles. It would also allow us to split the Ultima weapon article into Weapon and the actual sword. Moreover, it would give an opportunity to expand on other weapons that would normally only get 1-2 lines. Deckiller 23:27, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

:If you guys agree, I'll go ahead and create it. Deckiller 23:29, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

::Sounds good to me -- čĥàñľōŕď 23:41, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

Once again, I've been puttering around and trying to come up with an effective way to handle our infobox situation. If you don't know what I'm talking about, you're lucky... but if you're feeling masochistic, you can read up on the situation at the failed Final Fantasy VI featured article candidacy. One of the major complaints against the article was that WP:PJFF policy of putting the game logo in {{tl|Infobox VG}} is a strict no-no according to WP:CVG guidelines. It's been brought on multiple occassions at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Computer and video games, and we've spectacularly failed to alter the standing consensus on the matter. And, truth be told, I understand the case: consistency is definitely a worthwhile goal, and if we're going to be using WP:CVG templates, we should really use them properly. So anyway, a few days ago I was playing around with the Final Fantasy IV article to see about coming up with a better way to do things. The result was [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Final_Fantasy_IV&diff=36181503&oldid=36158081 this monstrosity], which, as User:Deckiller pointed out on the discussion page, was eye-bleedingly ugly. So I went back to the drawing board, and actually came up with two new {{tl|Infobox VG}} variants: {{tl|Infobox CVG large:image left}} and {{tl|Infobox CVG large:image right}}. They've been deployed on the Final Fantasy IV page, and I like 'em, personally. If we use this format, the number of images in the main infobox section should never exceed three, which can be made to fit without too much trouble. Thoughts, anyone? – Seancdaug 23:54, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

:I like the layout; it's really neat and fits well. Deckiller 23:57, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

::I'm not a fan. The juctioning of images in altogether quite jarring. I can't imaging that this would be any better than having the logo. While it conforms to the infobox template now, I doubt that intended so many front covers to be used. My solution would be to either put the very first Box Art or the very latest in the infobox of the game, and put the others either as they are discussed down the page (except as just thumbnail images, rather than an additional infobox and just have the release dates in the text) and put the release as they were before in a packaging artwork gallery. I quite like the gallery and it's a very nice way of presenting the various box arts. -- čĥàñľōŕď 00:05, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

:::The problem with that is that the cover images are all copyrighted, and, generally speaking, it's inappropriate to create galleries of fair use images. The only way we can legally claim fair use is when the images are presented in context, and thumbnail galleries do little to provide context. It's never come up directly, but attitudes towards copyright have been getting stricter on Wikipedia of late, and screenshot galleries have been removed from numerous pages as a result of copyright concerns. At least by having the images in the infobox, we can make a much stronger case that they are presented in the appropriate context (that is, in the context of detailed release information). And inlining the images is a good idea, in principle, but it makes laying out the page a logistical nightmare. Even if we do end up junking the multiple images (which I think is a mistake), I still think it's less confusing (and less messy) to have the textual release information in a seperate box. – Seancdaug 04:06, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

::::The other problem (which I forgot to mention) is that, if there is only one image in the infobox, most WP:CVG participants seem to prefer that the image used be the North American (or, at least, English language) release, which is a pretty big problem for us, since the original North American version of Final Fantasy IV, for instance, says Final Fantasy II pretty prominently on the box :). The "junctioning" (I like that word) of images was, again, suggested during the FFVI FAC, and seemed to be the most appropriate solution, provided the number of images is kept reasonably limited (no more than three or four), since it covers all of our bases while still conforming to CVG project guidelines. ::shrugs:: – Seancdaug 04:17, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

:::::Then may I suggest merging the various additional and different front box covers other than the original with the release information for each subsequent release. Eg, putting release dates and box covers together in a table/gallery. That way they are showing information and linking release dates to the covers of those releases. Also, if we are concerned with these images in terms of fair use, then perhaps we should consider reducing the resolution of the video game covers and screenshots in order to be more in-line with the terms of their fair use. I definitely don't think we should be putting multiple shots of cover boxes in the infoboxes though. Mainly for asthetics. -- čĥàñľōŕď 04:22, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

::::::Different strokes, I guess. I find keeping the cover boxes together is a lot more aesthetically pleasing that trying to space them out evenly throughout the text. I don't think image resolution is a real problem, though: the current guideline is "reduced resolution," and none of these images are, AFAIK, at serious archival-quality resolution. Not that I think it would seriously hurt to reduce the size of some of these images, since they really don't need to be much larger than the size of the thumbnails we're using to display them on the pages themselves. Leaving the image question aside for a brief moment, I think having seperate tables for every release is more versatile, since you can either have them stacked together in a seperate section (not my prefered choice, since it loses some contextual information, but we've been doing similar things in other articles, such as Final Fantasy), or you can put them in subsections concerning that particular version/port (like I've done in the FFIV example). Even without the image junctioning, I think the new templates have value. Returning to the image problem, though, I'm not really sure where else to put the images if not in the infobox. In a lot of cases, there are just too many images to effectively place them inline, and I'm not sure sticking, say, the excess Super NES box art images with the release data for the PlayStation port is really providing any stronger context than the old problematic gallery approach. – Seancdaug 04:38, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

:I posted my opinion on the FF4 talk page, but I'll post it again here: I prefer that the Final Fantasy games use the game logos and not the box art. The Final Fantasy series is somewhat unique in that every game from the 1980s to the 2000s has (at least has now) a similarly themed logo. For this reason, I think it is appropriate to use the game logo. This is first and foremost the Final Fantasy project, whatever the parantage, and showing the consistent logos between all 13 primary games fits the project rather well. If we must have the box art, I would much rather have the Japanese box art for three reasons. First, this is a Japanese game, not North American. Second, the accepted title of the game on Wikipedia (and the article's title) is Final Fantasy 4, contradicting the box art. Third, the North American box art is UGLY! All that red makes my eyes bleed. Guspaz 07:03, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

::Heh. The problem is that the Final Fantasy WikiProject is a subproject of, and theoretically held to the same guidelines as, the WP:CVG But, even beyond that, the CVG Infobox is maintained by WP:CVG, and if we're going to use it at all, we should use it according to the established guidelines. Moreover, failure to adhere to usage standards essentially derailed our last WP:FAC attempt, and I don't think that's likely to change. – Seancdaug 13:19, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

:I quite like the version on the page as I type, though I think a few pixels of spacing between the images, if possible, might both look neater and address Chanlord's initial concern. I agree with Guspaz about the choice of box art though, for the first two reasons if not the third ;) It's unfortunate that the CVG people prefer the US artwork, but I can't think of any valid reason for that choice off the top of my head, in fact it seems a remarkably arbitrary and POV-like decision that we'd do well to resist. >Gamemaker 13:00, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

::I don't think that's really fair, though: just as with article titles, I think the reasoning is that the artwork used should be the most recognizable to Wikipedia's intended audience. Since this is the English language Wikipedia, there's a fair chance that more readers will be familiar with the North American box art than the Japanese box art. But I'll see about adding some spacing between the images while we hash out the rest of the details, at least. – Seancdaug 13:19, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

:::Fair enough, I see that reasoning but I'm not sure it applies in this case. Recognition of the Final Fantasy brand outside of Japan has increased enormously since FF3 first made it to the USA, hence the decision in 1997 to forego renumbering the series and release worldwide with the Japanese title (apologies for preaching to the converted =)). It's partially because of that reason that the FF articles on Wikipedia are named after their Japanese titles. I think it makes more sense to see the boxart as information of historical value, rather than an aid to recognition. >Gamemaker 14:21, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Please don't take this the wrong way Seancdaug, I appreciate your extensive efforts to make the page conform to guidelines and still look pretty. But I have to say, I really feel this is a case of procedure over common sense. The logo in the infobox and separate gallery looked good, was easy to understand and just felt right. I'm going to miss it. --JiFish(^Talk/_Contrib) 02:07, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

:While I do think procedure is important, since we're ultimately playing in someone else's (WP:CVG, in this case) playground, the showstopper, to me, were the copyright concerns. Ultimately, my concern is that we come up with a viable solution to the problem now, lest we be forced into in the same way the screenshot galleries at PlayStation and other console pages came under heavy fire. I do get the aesthetic argument, but I also get the counterargument: as an encyclopedia, our job is to present information in as clear a way as possible (and, indeed, we need to do so in order to make a plausible case for fair use). Without contextualizing information, our cover galleries really weren't doing that. – Seancdaug 02:19, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

::As an addendum, I should point out my recent changes to the Final Fantasy IV article: I've moved all but the original Japanese box art out of the initial infobox, per Gamemaker's suggestion, and eliminated the obvious image junctioning in the subsequent infoboxes, as well. This spaces the images out so that it's possible to add the "leftover" images inline without creating ugly stackups. By and large, the original Japanese box art works well in the top infobox, and is, in most cases, really only an expanded version of the original logos (since historically the series has had a relatively minimalist look when it comes to cover art). And it should at least appease WP:CVG regulars, who will hopefully not shoot down our next attempt to get one of our articles featured :) – Seancdaug 02:24, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

:::I like it. The top infobox and the thumbnailed box covers are great. The PlayStation infobox is good. The WonderSwan and GBA infobox are just a bit bulky though. Can we thumbnail the screenshots and put them somewhere, or reduce them? On another note have a look at Final Fantasy XI's release date and cover box info. What do you think? -- čĥàñľōŕď 02:44, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

::::I'm glad to see the Japanese box art, a nice improvement. That satisfies half my complaint ;) EDIT: Is there a reason why the PS1/WSC/GBA infoboxes are left-aligned and block-formatted when the other infoxboxes/boxart are right-aligned and inline? I think the other console infoboxes should be made inline, at least, and right-aligned to match the rest at best. Guspaz 20:40, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

:::::Formatting issues, mainly. It prevents table "stack-ups" without requiring another 10 KB of code. Also, with the increased width, it scales poorly to lower resolutions if it's made inline, since it squeezes all the text into a very small column to the left. The basic problem is that we simply don't have enough text to make everything inline here without either force-clearing via CSS (which is inelegant and discouraged), or adding a lot more text (and I'm not sure padding the text just to make inline images/tables fit is a good idea). But I'm open to suggestions. – Seancdaug 20:53, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

::::The screenshot thing was just something I was playing around with, since I thought it might reduce page clutter: we've got a limited amount of real estate on the screen, and I thought it would make layout substantially less complicated. I'm not particularly wedded to the design, though. – Seancdaug 20:53, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

::::Re: the Final Fantasy XI layout. It's not bad, but I'm not sure what I think about the image presentation. It creates very tall cells with a lot of white space. Plus, I'm kind of think that it lacks the versatility of a full infobox, since it has fewer fields (no designer, rating, media, requirements, or input fields). Sticking with the same kind of infobox for every release also keeps a uniformity of display, while the horizontal table design reads quite differently from the main infobox. Seemingly minor concerns, I admit, but as a graduate student in information studies, these are the sort of presentation and access issues to which I pay particular attention. I still think the most elegant solution is stacking boxes (see this article for an example of what I mean), but I seem to be in the minority on that one. :-) – Seancdaug 21:05, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

Just to explain what the new sub-project is, I noticed that on the CVG style guide and of course our own style guide we try not to use words like "you" but instead "the player". I've played around with Google and found a way I might be able to reduce how many "you"s we get in articles. I don't know where this project will go, but at the moment I'm using it to comb the articles. Feel free to help but don't feel you have to. And I'm still working on reorganising the project so it's a little more user friendly too. Cheers guys, post a message even if to say hi ☺ — cuaHL 21:30, 29 January 2006 (UTC)